


The Words You Chose, The Way You Write

by akatonbo



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types, Les Misérables - Victor Hugo
Genre: Epistolary, First Kiss, M/M, Post-Seine
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-11
Updated: 2020-04-11
Packaged: 2021-03-02 04:35:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 2,495
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23599213
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/akatonbo/pseuds/akatonbo
Summary: When the novelty of receiving them wears off, you will find my letters dull. I do not see why we should continue this farce until you tire of them. Now that you have seen I have nothing of interest to say, I request that you release me from this promise at once.
Relationships: Javert/Jean Valjean
Comments: 21
Kudos: 83





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Nuizlaziai](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nuizlaziai/gifts).



> Happy birthday, Vin! I saw you'd prompted for epistolary fic in some exchange or other, and once I imagined Javert writing Valjean letters and griping about it the whole time, I was pretty much obligated to write it. There's a whole bunch of stuff going on between the lines here and I hope I've included enough bits and pieces that you can extrapolate some of what's not directly shown. Also, since most of this fic is meant to have been words on paper, there are some things that have been ~~crossed out~~ in some of the letters. In-story, assume it's largely illegible, though a word or phrase here and there might be able to be made out...
> 
> Title from my go-to epistolary song, If I Wrote You by Dar Williams.

November 5, 1832

M. Fauchelevent,

As you insist that I must write to you, I am doing so. 

I have settled in my new room. It is adequate for my needs and I am promised that the portress is not too much of a busybody. I have also taken an office for my new endeavors. It is perhaps of a size with your daughter's wardrobe closet, but it will fit a desk and chair and a small cabinet, and the rent is low enough that I expect to repay what you lent me before the spring if my services are useful. M. Gisquet has agreed to inform the prefecture that they may pass inquiries judged not to merit police investigation to me if they see fit. As I suppose that you cannot reply to me without one, the address is included below. I shall thank you not to come knocking on my door. 

I expect that you will tell me all about your daughter's upcoming wedding whether or not I wish to hear about it.

~~Do you~~ ~~How is~~ ~~If~~

I do not know why I let you talk me into this, or what you expect from it, or why you should want me to do it in the first place. I am bad at this, ~~Val~~ Fauchelevent. I have never had any aptitude for social niceties, nor do I wish to. When the novelty of receiving them wears off, you will find my letters dull. I do not see why we should continue this farce until you tire of them. Now that you have seen I have nothing of interest to say, I request that you release me from this promise at once.

Respectfully,  
Javert


	2. Chapter 2

November 8, 1832

Dear M. Javert,

I was very pleased to receive your letter and hear that you are well. Despite all your assurances before you left my home, I do worry, especially since you are so set against visiting. Are you open for business now? I hope you will not mind if I also send the occasional client your way, should I encounter someone who has need of your investigative acumen. I must insist again, however, that the funds I gave you to begin this venture are not a loan, but a gift. If you feel obligated to repay it regardless, I would like it best if you would distribute it to the needy, according to your own judgement. 

Though you may find it hard to believe, I am sure Cosette is even giddier than when you last saw her. She is young and in love, her beloved is alive and will be hers, and that both these things are true, after she once despaired of either, shines from her face like a beacon. M. Gillenormand is completely charmed by her and has showered her with heirlooms. He is more involved with the actual wedding preparations than I, but it will be in the middle of February. You will receive an invitation, though I know you will likely decline.

She is often at the house on rue des Filles-du-Calvaire, as the boy is not well enough to go out yet. Most often I accompany her, but sometimes Toussaint is her chaperone. It is most peculiar -- I would certainly never describe you as noisy, but now that you are gone the house is too quiet when Cosette is not here.

I do not expect you to write me clever stories, or artful turns of phrase; I want to know how you are. I am just a foolish old man who has never had a confidant before these last months, and in the absence of your company I only ask that you keep me apprised of your welfare. 

In friendship,  
Jean


	3. Chapter 3

November 19, 1832

M. Fauchelevent,

I remain baffled as to why you should want to hear anything from me at all. It would be better if you were to forget me; have I not caused you hardship enough? Yet, having promised it, I find I cannot deny you this. 

My office is open, and I have had some inquiries. A small few have been deserving of exploration. I have located a lost cat (custody of the moggie will now be shared), discovered that a man had a mistress on behalf of his wife, and that a man had a wife on behalf of his mistress (not the same man), and resolved one gratifying mystery involving the whereabouts of a man's long-missing brother. Should you happen to know someone who has reasonable expectations about a bona fide question, you may refer them to me. (I suppose there is no use in forbidding you to pay their fees, as I'm sure it will not stop you. Perhaps I will discharge my debt by simply not charging them, so there is nothing for you to pay.)

You are correct that I must decline any invitation to your daughter's wedding. That is not a place where I belong by any reckoning. 

After all of the strays you have taken in -- and I count myself among their number -- I cannot imagine your house will remain quiet for long if you do not wish it. Your daughter, her mother, your housekeeper, even Fauchelevent... you have a habit, ~~Valj~~ ~~shit~~ The city of Paris is full of strays. You will scarcely have to look to find some destitute waif who will prove to be a far more companionable guest than a half-drowned police inspector who snarls and snaps at a gentle hand like a wounded animal. 

Respectfully,  
Javert


	4. Chapter 4

November 21, 1832

Dear M. Javert,

I must beseech you to rethink declining to attend Cosette's wedding. She has asked me to request it of you, not only so that I may have a friend at my side, but because she also wishes to see you. She too thinks of your well-being after the months you spent in our home. If that is not enough to sway you, then please consider this: out of all the guests who will be there, almost none of them will be there for her. It is all the grandfather's friends who make up the guest list. We have led such sequestered lives, there is no one to invite. It is the same for the boy -- all his friends died that night in June on the rue de Chanvrerie. It is only the three of us who were there and survived. Surely the bride and groom, who are the reason for the ostentatious party M. Gillenormand has planned, deserve some guests who are truly there to see them wed. Please, Javert, if you will not come on my behalf, then do it on theirs. 

~~I do not~~ ~~You are~~ ~~It is~~

~~A foundling who knows me only as their savior from privation cannot take the place of the one man who has known me through all the names I have worn.~~

I do not want to forget you.

Sincerely,  
Jean


	5. Chapter 5

December 3, 1832

M. Fauchelevent,

Again I must decline. I have no place ~~at your side~~ at such a celebration. 

You should not call me a friend. ~~I do not deserve~~ ~~I have no idea how~~ You should not seek my company. 

Javert


	6. Chapter 6

December 17, 1832

M. Fauchelevent,

As another fortnight has passed, I am fulfilling my obligation to you, but I have little of import to share. My work has been steady but prosaic; my lodging remains adequate. It seems absurd to send you a letter every fortnight just to say that nothing is going on. 

The walk from my room to my office passes through a street market. It is noisy and bright and exactly the sort of thing I find exhausting to experience at length, but in small doses I do not mind it so much. Even in the dead of winter it is full of life. 

~~Last week I failed to~~ ~~Last week I saw a gamin steal an apple~~

~~Last week I thought on something you told me once about your nieces and nephews~~

I do not know what else I should say. 

Javert


	7. Chapter 7

January 7, 1833

Just as Javert was thinking that he should have walked, that he might stop the thrice-damned fiacre and walk the rest of the way just so that he could _move_ instead of waiting, unable to sit still, to be moved, the carriage finally pulled up to the Rue de l'Homme Arme and stopped at the entrance to the narrow street. He all but leapt from the carriage, paid the driver, and strode down the street with a disorienting sense of deja vu, up the stairs to the door of number seven, which he gave a good staccato wallop.

"VAL-- goddamnit, FAUCHELEVENT!" he shouted, heedless of what sort of gossip he might be sowing seeds for, intent on putting to rest the disquiet that had driven him there.

After a few moments, the door opened to reveal Valjean, and it felt as if a great weight fell from Javert's shoulders at the sight of him in apparent safety. 

For his part, Valjean looked stunned, wide-eyed and slack-mouthed. "Ah-- Javert," he gasped, "I did not expect to... what brings you here?"

All at once Javert felt like a fool. Had he not insisted he did not want to do this very thing, to see Valjean again? And now not only had he done it, he had raced across the city in a panic, found Valjean, and either he must reveal his foolishness or think of a convincing lie... and as the latter was unlikely even at the best of times, he swallowed his pride. "I... I had not heard from you in more than a month, and I did not know if you were..."

"Oh," Valjean said softly. His eyes were very... Javert did not know the right word, something soft and and shining. "Come in, please. It is cold, and surely you have not come here to stand on my doorstep." 

Valjean stepped back and aside, and Javert followed him in, muttering ruefully, "I suppose this is why you insisted I write to you."

"Well... yes," Valjean admitted. "But I did not think you would-- you have been quite clear, after all, that you do not desire my companionship." As I do yours, the mournful downward cast of his eyes suggested, setting Javert's heart to thudding fitfully in his chest, and he cursed himself for a fool again. It was not as if he did not already _know_ that Valjean had some attachment to him.

It must have been the lurching in his chest that distracted him into blurting out, "That is not--" Hell. "It is not that I spurn your company, but rather that I have no right to it."

"No _right_ \-- Javert, you have _every_ right. I... I have missed your presence. I have missed even just knowing that you were no further than the next room. I do not know how you believe you have wronged me, but do not take yourself from me just to deprive yourself."

"It is not so simple," Javert protested. They had not even moved from the entryway and now Valjean had come closer, much too close for Javert's ability to maintain his composure. 

"It is exactly that simple," Valjean said, calmer and steadier now. He reached out to lay a hand on Javert's shoulder, urging him forward. "Please, come in and sit. No one else is here, there is no one to hear if we talk of the past. Or the present -- I assure you, no matter how dull you might think stories of your day-to-day doings to be, I still want to hear how you tell them."

Javert took a step back, panicked. "I should not be here. I have-- you would not want--" Valjean was still too close. Now that he was right there in front of Javert, the months they had been apart had only magnified his unseemly longing. He could not stand to sit across the table from Valjean and talk of inconsequential things while Valjean looked at him with such gentle eyes. And Valjean, concerned, was always so attentive a companion that he could not fail to notice Javert's gradual unraveling under that gaze. He was _already_ unraveling.

"After everything else we have endured, do you think I would repudiate you now, no matter what you would tell me?" 

He could not bear seeing Valjean plead with him this way. He could not think. He could not see how to extricate himself from this ill-considered course of action without causing Valjean sorrow. He could not-- he lurched forward, fitting one hand to Valjean's jaw and pressing their lips clumsily together.

It was hardly a kiss. He didn't know what he was doing, Valjean was plainly taken aback and could not be anything but appalled, but at the same time his intractable heart felt like it might split open his chest like a sprout cleaving a seed. And yet, after a moment that wild elation gave way to the realization that he was just standing there like a statue with his mouth against Valjean's, and that was hardly momentous, especially since Valjean did not--

Valjean drew in a sharp breath through his nose. He threw his arms around Javert's waist and pulled him closer with an abrupt, jerky movement, making a muffled, beseeching sound as his lips moved awkwardly against Javert's, and Javert stopped thinking entirely, everything else subsumed by the idea that Valjean, too, might want this, and the soft slide of lips on lips.

He drew back only reluctantly, when a clatter outside reminded him that they were still barely inside the door of Valjean's home, and he did not know when Valjean's daughter and housekeeper might return. When he saw the way Valjean looked, flushed and unfocused, he wanted to kiss him again. "I... I was not expecting..."

"Neither did I imagine this might be the reason you would not see me," Valjean murmured, looking up at him in wonder. "I did not realize at first why your absence was so unbearable to me, only that it was, and then... well, Cosette said something about how it felt to be parted from Marius, and I fled from the room like a frightened rabbit when I realized she was describing just how I felt."

"Jean," Javert breathed, and then froze, as he realized what he had said. "That is, I-- I do not mean to presume, only that you signed your letters--"

"I do not mind," Valjean said hurriedly. "I signed them that way because I did not want to use an alias with you. But to hear my Christian name on your lips is... pleasing."

Javert nearly kissed him again for that, but now Valjean drew back, his arms falling from around Javert's waist. "Come in from the doorway. The settee is far more comfortable, and we have much to talk about now."

Javert followed him.


End file.
